


#1 Dad

by chucks_prophet



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Domestic, But Nothing In Detail Hence T Rating, Castiel and Dean Winchester are Cute, Competition, Domestic Castiel/Dean Winchester, Domestic Fluff, Eventual Happy Ending, Father's Day, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Happy Ending, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Parents Castiel & Dean Winchester, Sexual Humor, Some angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-13
Updated: 2017-04-13
Packaged: 2018-10-18 08:35:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10613205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chucks_prophet/pseuds/chucks_prophet
Summary: “You’re cute,” Dean comments, because it is cute, the way he’s trying to distract Dean into burning his pancakes, or worse, making him forget this is a competition.So, to help jog both their memories, Dean swipes the butter off Cas’s pancakes with his two fingers and drops it into his pan. It cooks and sizzles before coating the entirety of the pancake like spray-on sunscreen, the way it runs off sides when Dean moves it around with a knife.Cas’s mouth hangs open as he scoffs, “You have officially gone to the dark side, Dean Winchester.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> So I'm way early on Father's Day, but once you read this, I think you'll know why I had to write it! It was just one of those ideas that was too cute not to. Hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did writing it! <3

 

"C'mon, it'll be fun."

"Fun? I think you mean disastrous.”

“Why? Are you afraid you’re going to lose?” Cas asks, teasing.

“Babe,” Dean says, clasping his hands in front of him, “I’m just trying to save our marriage.”

Cas raises his brows. “C’mon, Dean. Don’t you think that’s a little melodramatic?”

It's not Cas’s fault. Many have been led to believe they can do anything—which is true 99% of the time. The other 1% standing in the way is Dean.

But Cas  _knows_ this. And he still wants to challenge him.

And hell, that's why he loves him. 

Except, after this competition, they may not love each other. This week is the week that leads up to Father’s Day. And granted it’s their first year being fathers, Cas thinks it would be a good idea to compete for the role of best new dad. Only, Dean’s amygdala produces a concept of competition so primitive that he may as well find a slab of stone and make himself a spear.

He remembers as far back as kindergarten, when he brought his crayon set to school with  _64_  different colors. (He was also the first one in his class to recite to 100, leaving Harry Spengler to eat the dust left behind by his training wheels.) There’s no way no one would be any cooler than him. That is, until Bela Talbot came sauntering up to her work station with her impressive 96 crayon collection, evil smirk and all. Dean fumed so hard, he broke ten of his crayons that day in one sitting. And for a five-year-old, that was quite the spectacle.

Of course, no spectacle like the  _120_  pack of crayons Dean returned with the next day.

Bela never tried testing him again. Neither did anyone throughout his life. Not even his own brother anymore. (If their prank wars, may they rest in peace after the unfortunate incident involving the hair dryer is anything to show for.) Not Gordon, or Richie, or Victor, or Benny, or Meg, or Ruby or—

Yeah…

“Do you remember Halloween last year? When I took Claire and Alex trick or treating because Jody had to pull the night shift?” Dean asks.

“Hell yeah, I do! I came home to find our house  _teepeed_! We’re lucky Jody took that shift. I couldn’t get into the house until the fire department came to help take it down.”

Dean cringes a little. Well, if they’re going to do this, they may as well be completely honest: “Well, they  _may_  have played a small part in that. And I  _may_  have sort of… aided them.”

Cas’s blue eyes are the first to pop open, followed by his perfectly pink and pillowy lips. “What?”

“I know, I’m sorry, I should’ve—”

 _“Why would you want to teepee our own house?!”_ Cas rages.

“I was mad at you!” Dean contends, albeit lamely, since he’s the one at fault. “You gave me the silent treatment for like three days because I didn’t hand-wash your trench coat.”

“It was my favorite coat!”

“And now it’s  _Emma’s_ favorite coat,” Dean defends. “I mean, she does look adorable in it, right? So that didn’t go to complete shit.”

“Unlike Halloween,” Cas sneers. “At least then I had plenty of toilet paper to mop it up with.”

Dean scoffs, then dares take a step closer. If five years of marriage has taught them anything, it’s that Cas can be scary when he’s angry. But Dean’s also too determined to back down now that he’s riled up too: “Alright. Okay. You’re on. Let’s do this little competition of yours. And you better stock up on Benadryl, because you’re going to be eating my dust.”

Yeah, almost thirty years later and even his insults are still the same.

“I will if you will,” Cas bites back.

"You know us arguing only turns me on, right?"

"No, no!" Cas attests, holding out an accusing finger far enough to keep Dean at bay. "If we're going to start this today, we're absolutely  _not_ going to have sex."

A smile nudges Dean’s lips. "Who said we had to start today?"

Cas practically growls before pulling in Dean by the lapel of his sleep-ragged flannel.

*

“You’re gonna go down,” Dean retorts.

Cas, despite the shaky laugh that escapes him, says, “That’s a funny way of trash-talking when you’re the one heading in that direction.”

***

**Day 1**

“Where are we heading again?” Dean says, looking up into the rearview of his ’67 Chevy to see a beaming six-year-old in Princess Leia-style buns and a new sunflower dress—the latter two courtesy of his husband, who gave Emma the day of her dreams when he took her to buy a whole new wardrobe. The buns were an added touch, because Emma loves _Star Wars_ and clearly, Cas is upping his game early on in the competition.

But that’s okay. Dean will take it up _thirty_ notches. By the look on Emma’s face, he already has because she proudly exclaims, “THE ICE CREAM SHOP!”

Cas’s face peaks with both anger and surprise next to him. “Oh no! That’s not fair—!”

“What? Afraid you’re going to lose?” Dean teases.

Cas scoffs, “No, _I’m afraid for_ _our child’s_ _health._ Ice cream for dinner?!”

“Daddy is the best!” Emma declares, in reference to the one and only Dean Winchester.

Dean: 1. Cas: 0.

***

**Day 2**

Okay, so maybe Dean got off on the wrong foot. But he won’t let that foot be his Achilles’ heel. True, he won the first day, but it was a cop-out of some good, old-fashioned quality time with his daughter. Ice cream may be delicious, but Emma will grow up remembering the things most important to her that Dean made the time and effort for.

Such as tea parties.

They sit in the middle of the park, with a small, expendable pink table between them. Over Dean’s grungy work clothes is a glittery rainbow bib no bigger than the length of his calloused hands, already spilt with invisible tea because even in a pretend universe, Dean is a klutz. His cheeks are painted bright red to match the miniature teacup in his hands, and sitting atop his head is a polka-dot party hat.

Emma, of course, is dressed for her best in one of the new dresses Cas bought for her, this one a Cinderella-themed dress: bright yellow with extra fluff at the bottom to match her blonde and always messy hair. What makes Dean really smile though is her choice of foot attire: not glass slippers, but sneakers. And not just any sneakers. Muddy, worn, and faded black sneakers that she refuses to toss.

Dean toasts to upcoming victory—er, to good tea. That’s what he means.

Although, when Dean gets home and finds Cas in the backyard, he’s greeted to more than just his smug, but ridiculously hot husband.

There’s a friggin’ bouncy house. In the middle of their lawn.

Needless to say, Emma bolts to the thing. But Cas doesn’t stop there. No, he doesn’t just become the household savior, but the _neighborhood_ savior when he invites some of the neighborhood kids to join Emma for a last-minute party. The adults that end up mingling in the backyard congratulate him on the idea, so that they can finally relax.

But Dean is far from relaxed. No, his motivation is ballooning faster than the bouncy house in his yard. Especially when Cas just winks across the way with a devilish smile.

Cas: 1. Dean: 1.

***

**Day 3**

If there’s something Emma loves possibly even more than Dean, who’s a mechanic by trade, it’s cars.

But not just any cars: _Hot Wheels._

And what better idea than to take Emma out of school and go down to the _Hot Wheels Museum,_ live and in-person? Trick question, there _is_ no better idea. Dean’s not even sure what Cas came up with, because he leaves a flyer for the museum under a red sticky note that says, simply, “Suck it.”

Dean: 2. Cas: 1.

*******

**Day 4**

It starts with Cas proposing the idea of a family breakfast. 

What it ends up turning into is a battle over who can make the best pancakes.

Having raised a little brother who wanted tuna, hot dogs,  _and_ fluff marshmallows on his macaroni and cheese, pancakes are a fairly easy feat. Plus, he’s going to go all out. If Cas thinks he can win Emma over with blueberry chocolate pancakes, he’s sorely mistaken. 

“Move over, I need butter,” Dean grunts, lightly tapping Cas’s hip with his own.

Cas taps back a little harder. “You should’ve thought of that before we were crammed in the corner of the kitchen. What’re you even making, anyway?” he asks, glancing over at Dean’s pan with a scoff, “Looks like a regular pancake to me. Slightly misshapen, but a pancake, nonetheless.”

“That’s because it’s a regular pancake from your perspective,” Dean says. “Besides, a magician’s not supposed to reveal his secrets.”

“Hmm,” Cas hums, moving to wrap his arms around Dean’s backside, “not even for a…?” He leans in teasingly close to Dean’s ear to whisper the last part, his breath hot and heavy against the spiral of his ear.

“You’re cute,” Dean comments, because it _is_ cute, the way he’s trying to distract Dean into burning his pancakes, or worse, making him forget this is a competition.

So, to help jog both their memories, Dean swipes the butter off Cas’s pancakes with his two fingers and drops it into his pan. It cooks and sizzles before coating the entirety of the pancake like spray-on sunscreen, the way it runs off sides when Dean moves it around with a knife.

Cas’s mouth hangs open as he scoffs, “You have officially gone to the dark side, Dean Winchester.”

“My pancake begs to differ, because,” Dean says, and lets the rest speak for itself as he flips his patty.

On the opposite side rests the face of Harrison Ford, clearly imprinted on the back as if photo copied, complete with the blaster pistol and ridiculously grounded-down smolder, made entirely of pancake batter.

“Holy shit,” Cas breathes. Dean just tosses him a smug look and starts walking towards the kitchen table, where Emma is patiently awaiting her breakfast.

Of course, being _too_ smug can apparently act as headlights and render you momentarily blind, because Dean ends up slipping on his robe tie halfway, sending the pancake airborne before it plops on the tile.

Cas: 2. (But only by default!) Dean: 2.

***

**Day 5**

The last day of the competition. The tie-breaker. The moment of truth.

Dean has just the thing that’ll win him the competition.  

That is, until he picks a crying Emma up from school. Then: _Poof!_

That’s the thing about being a parent: It’s like reflective glass windows; everything becomes centered on his daughter and whose parents he’s going to be giving stink eyes to at the next PTA.

“What’s wrong, angel?” he asks, bending down to meet her big, blue eyes. Seriously, for a child that has fifty percent of _his_ DNA, she sure does remind him a lot of Cas. Her eyes have the same urgency to be met, but the same gentleness about them that gives him clarity when he needs it most.

Emma responds with a hard staccato of sniffles. A long, frazzled strand of blonde hair falls into her mouth, but Dean tucks it out of the way.

That’s another thing he’s learned from the both of them: patience. Dean was a certified hothead before he met Cas, ready to blow like the gasket on one of the cars he fixes. Cas is a chiropractor, who’s basically skilled in relaxing people. But it wasn’t the monthly adjustments that helped him mellow out: It’s Cas’s continuous love for him, and Dean’s love for him. It’s his gummy smile, the wrinkles around his eyes that unveil when he laughs, his stupidly messy hair, and that ridiculous trenchcoat he used to wear (we know what happened there). Everything.

“Was it someone from class?” Dean asks.

Emma shakes her head and stutters, “N-no, it’s you and Papa.”

Dean narrows his eyes, flummoxed. “What do you mean, angel?”

Emma sets down her backpack and unzips the top, retrieving a piece of paper and handing it to Dean. On it is a single yellow tulip, painted in watercolor. In the corner is Emma’s curly signature (much like her father’s) and above that, it reads: _To Daddy and Papa._ “I made that for Father’s Day, and we-we couldn’t make two so I could give a tulip to b-both of you because Miss Bradstone said kids can only have _one_ daddy.”

Dean frowns. As mad as a declaration like that would have made him years ago, now all he feels is overwhelming sadness for his daughter— _their_ daughter.

“But I-I love both of you,” she continues, “Both of you should have a flower. I don’t—I—”

“Hey, hey,” Dean soothes, opening his arms for her. Emma falls in without complaint. Honestly, he feels _himself_ starting to tear up. The sadness is starting to morph into something else. He pulls her back gently to cup her rosy face with a broad smile. “I love you, angel. And if Papa was here, he would tell you the same. And you know what?” he says, holding out the painting, “Papa and I can share this. I don’t mind one bit.”

Realizing his own words, Dean pauses for a laugh. So does a familiar, raspy voice behind him: “Neither do I.”

Dean turns around and smiles up shyly at Cas. Cas smiles back, big and gummily as he says to Emma, “He’s right, sweetheart. I love you to Heaven and back. Nothing will ever change that.”

And okay, Dean _does_ actually start to cry. Emma, living up to her nicknames, leans in and wraps Dean in a hug. Then Cas places a hand on Dean’s shoulder, leans over, and drops a kiss on the top of his caramel hair.

Yeah, Dean thinks, this “best dad” competition is a worthless cause. They’re _both_ awesome dads—at least according to Emma, which is the only opinion that matters to him.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, the Hot Wheels Museum is ACTUALLY A THING! And I didn't know about it until now!!!  
> Also, Dean's pancake was inspired by that one Vine where that guy makes Elsa and Anna's faces in pancakes for his daughter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FG6QyZj3AfE


End file.
